Business/Financial Desk
| May 22, 2003, Thursday
2 Paths of
Bayer Drug in 80's: Riskier One Steered
Overseas
By WALT BOGDANICH and ERIC KOLI
(NYT) 3598 words
Late Edition - Final , Section A ,
Page 1 , Column 5
ABSTRACT
- Cutter Biological, unit of Bayer AG,
apparently sold millions of dollars of
blood-clotting medicine for hemophiliacs
that carried high risk of transmitting AIDS
to Asia and Latin America in mid-1980's,
while selling new, safer product in West;
Cutter Biological introduced its safer
medicine in Feb 1984 as evidence mounted
that earlier version, Factor VIII, was
infecting hemophiliacs with HIV; company
continued to sell old medicine overseas;
records show Cutter officials were trying to
avoid being stuck with large stores of
product that was proving increasingly
unmarketable in US and Europe; show company
continued to make old medicine for several
months after it began selling new product;
telex from Cutter to distributor suggests
motive: that Cutter had several fixed-price
contracts and believed old product, which
was not heated, would be cheaper to produce;
precise human toll of these marketing
decisions two decades ago may be impossible
to document now; in Hong Kong and Taiwan
alone, more than 100 hemophiliacs got HIV
after using Cutter's old medicine, and many
have since died; Cutter continued to sell
older product after Feb 1984 in Malaysia,
Singapore, Indonesia, Japan and Argentina;
figures are from Cutter documents produced
in connection with lawsuits filed by
American hemophiliacs; Bayer issues
statement defending Cutter, saying company
continued to sell old medicine because some
customers doubted new drug's effectiveness,
and some countries were slow to approve its
sale; in US, AIDS was passed on to thousands
of hemophiliacs, many of whom died, before
new product was developed; Bayer and three
other companies, while admitting no
wrongdoing, have paid hemophiliacs about
$600 million to settle more than 15 years of
lawsuits; photos; chronology of events (L) A
division of the pharmaceutical company Bayer
sold millions of dollars of blood-clotting
medicine for hemophiliacs -- medicine that
carried a high risk of transmitting AIDS --
to Asia and Latin America in the mid-1980's
while selling a new, safer product in the
West, according to documents obtained by The
New York Times.
The Bayer unit, Cutter Biological,
introduced its safer medicine in late
February 1984 as evidence mounted that the
earlier version was infecting hemophiliacs
with H.I.V. Yet for over a year, the company
continued to sell the old medicine overseas,
prompting a United States regulator to
accuse Cutter of breaking its promise to
stop selling the product.
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